Mike Walker's Blog

Gartner EA Summit - Day 2

As for the second day of coverage of the EA summit I attended less sessions and did more talking with other architects at the conference so I will not have a whole lot to say about most of the sessions.

I did observe that there was quite the drop-off between day 1 and day 2 for some reason. I am not sure if it was due to work pressures by their employers or if there were other reasons (economy?).

SOA and EA Lessons Learned

This was another good session from Nick Gall. There was a great deal of discussion around further definition of SOA and then led into a case study discussion of what others have done. For me this was the best part of the presentation. It was good to see what has and hasn't worked for companies. What I didn't see in the presentation was the alignment of SOA and EA. It through me off and was expecting something different. A rename of the session would of done the trick in my opinion.

The Best Enterprise Architects Don’t Work Too Hard

In my opinion this was one of the best sessions at the conference. Brian Burke really got to the heart of the matter with this one. He put some really grounding around building, maturing and sustaining an EA practice at all levels. This wasn't the typical "Build it and they will come" type of pitch but a much more pragmatic approach. I agreed with 100% of what he had to say. I have some scares on my back from living trough some of the mistakes but I think we all have in some way...

I like that he is so candid in this presentation where he talks about not fighting battles you can't win, don't try to change an unchangeable organization. It's was very good for folks in all different ranges between just starting an EA practice to being in the trenches dealing with adoption/political issues.

I'm not sure if Brian will be writing more on this topic but hopefully he will present and write more on this topic. If you have access to Gartner they are worth a look.

• Organize Your Enterprise Architecture Effort: Tips for Game Planning and Launching the EA Program
• Predicts 2008: Emerging Trends Force a Clearer and Deeper Focus on Enterprise Architecture
• Architecting the Emergent Enterprise: New Game, New Rules

Cloud Computing - How Getting “Served” will Alter Your Architectural Plans

This was one of those really meaty sessions that I will not be able to give a whole lot of details on unfortunately. Darryl Plummer did a great job of articulating this space. He went into defining the cloud and demystifying it a bit. I thought this was a message that was very much needed. Here at Microsoft we have defined the cloud in a similar way but they take a more holistic industry approach which is good for architects that are looking at wiring up multiple clouds or trying to differentiate between different cloud platforms.

An area that is explored in some detail was how the architecting process and architecture decisions change when developing solutions for the cloud. This is an area in which I would like to talk more about as well. I think this is the higher order bit, more important than trying to create the all-up definition of the cloud. The reality is that there isn't going to be one major cloud, there are going to be several major cloud vendors and most companies will leverage multiple clouds for various purposes.

I really liked his presentation and thought it was one of the top presentations at the conference. As a side note, I would really like to see a wiring up of this presentation and with a presentation that David Chappell presented on at an internal Microsoft conference called TechReady that was based on "a short introduction to cloud platforms" paper he had wrote. Blending the holistic space with architecture classifications and styles would be ideal.

Summary

So in summary, the conference was a bit different than others in the past. When looking at the agenda it was really obvious the lack of SOA and ESB tracks. It seems as if Gartner is backing away from SOA a bit. The SOA tracks were filled with relatively new concepts. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing, it's actually refreshing to see some diversification.  However, I wonder if there are other motivations such as a negative market trend towards SOA. I didn't hear this from Gartner, but one has to wonder if there analysis is surfacing data like this. Time will tell...

As I have stated above and in other posts, I am happy to see a more pragmatic Gartner. A few years ago I remember have consults with them and hearing that tools such as Word and Visio should not be used in EA. Now the tone has changed a bit. I had counted five sessions where EVP Tools (i.e., Office Productivity tools such as Microsoft Office) should be leveraged at certain levels of maturity. I think this is spot on. Use a tool until you outgrow it. Just because you start out using Visio doesn't mean that you will always be using it. I think this was driven home in the key note where they pulled some data from the April 2008 EA Market Survey that stated:

72% are interested in EA Tools - with 80% of you still using the "EVP tool suite" and an intranet site

My time in London was filled with great conversations with some really smart architects and I want to thank all the folks that I was able to connect with and gain new perspectives on this radically evolving space of enterprise architecture. See all of you at the next event!

 

Technorati Tags: Enterprise Architecture,Gartner,Cloud,Events

ArchiMate - The Emerging Architecture Modeling Standard?

At the Gartner EA Summit in London it seemed like there was quite a bit of talk on the solution showcase floor regarding an architecture modeling standard called Archimate. I'm not sure if this was due to the fact that this was a European event (ArchiMate derived from the Netherlands) or if there is truly significant reasons to have the buzz.

It looks like there are two primary drivers behind all the buzz:

• Open Group has now adopted
• Customer & Tooling Vendor up take

 

What is ArchiMate?

If you are not familiar with ArchiMate, it is open architecture modeling standard. It focuses on the visualization of viewpoints and notations on models. It was a result of a 4 million Euro Dutch Government project to create a unifying architecture modeling standard. The standard conforms to the traditional BAIT model (Business, Application, Information, Technology) for representing architecture descriptions.

There are some unique details to the ArchiMate standard which include how they implement behaviors. You can see this in the meta-model below:

There is a notion of the Structure and the Behavior aspects of an architecture. There is a clear separation in the ArchiMate implementation.

Another thing I like about ArchiMate is that it focuses on a core problem rather than trying to solve many problems in a not so great way. This of course is architecture modeling. The models are at a higher level of abstraction than design or development models. Do you see limited or no overlap with standards such as UML and BPMN. There are touch points in these other modeling languages. AchiMate can also be stitched into existing EA frameworks such as TOGAF. There are resources available that describe the touch points between the modeling standard and the EA process framework.

If you are not familiar with ArchiMate I would recommend the following sources to get caught up:

• ArchiMate Quick Reference & Using ArchiMate
• Open Group ArchiMate site
• Sethuraj Nair post "Archimate It's Time had Come"
• Open Group Research Work

 

Vendor Support of ArchiMate

Arguably one of the major deciding factors in a standard is the uptake and productization of the implementation of a standard. Surprisingly, there has been a great deal of recent activity with picking up this modeling standard.

There were a lot of vendors that claimed that they had support for it. These include:

• IDS Sheer
• Bizzdesign Architect 
• Casewise 
• Avolution Abacus (not at the conference)

 

For all the folks using Office tooling there is a solution for you as well. ArchiMate stencils for Microsoft Visio.

 

Open Group and ArchiMate

From what I can tell with talking with some Open Group members here at the conference is that the Open Group has indeed picked up ArchiMate. There is still discussion in the architecture working groups around how this will be positioned, aligned and evangelized by the Open Group.

As you can see from the agenda items for the upcoming Munich event, there is a great deal of planning that still needs to occur.

• ArchiMate Standard Version 1.0
• ArchiMate certification

• 2009 Planning and Discussion
• Formation of workgroups and standing committees
• Coordination status with other groups
• Charter discussion and approval

 

So back to the question, is ArchiMate the next big modeling standard for architecture? It has the potential to be so. As mentioned before, between the Open Group and the tool vendors the standard is coming out strong. It is hard to tell at this point. We really need to see this in the wild to really get a grip on if this is yet another academic standard or something that is adoptable by the masses. 

I think ArchiMate had found a good home at the Open Group. TOGAF does a great job at the process but needs more grounding standards to make TOGAF all that more actionable for enterprises.

Technorati Tags: Modeling,Enterprise Architecture,TOGAF,ArchiMate

Gartner EA Summit - Day 1

So I figured since I already started a thread on the Gartner keynote (Gartner EA Summit - Emergence Enterprise Architecture Keynote) I should finish what I started, huh?

Just so everyone knows, this is Gartner's London EA Summit event and not the North American event. It does seem a lot smaller than the other EA events. I am not sure if it is the case in attendance or just the facilities but it does seem a lot smaller.

I will do a recap of my key thoughts so far on the conference. I hoped around a bit between different tracks based on my interests. Keep in mind I am not going to divulge too much on Gartner's materials here. I'll mostly offer up my opinions on the sessions.

Understanding the Market and selecting an EA Tool

This was the first session I went to after the keynote. I think Robert Handler did a good job of presenting this topic but it is pretty clear that this is for folks that are new to the EA Tools space. For the most part it was very much 101. Keep in mind this isn't a negative comment, just the context.

Even though it was some what beginner in nature there was some fresh and good nuggets in there that are worth pointing out explicitly.

• The notion that there is a trade-off between the Usability (Simple/Clean/"Keep it Simple Stupid") and Functionality (Rocket Scientist, "You want it, we got it")
• EA Tooling Status
• Recommended using Office or what is referred to as the EVP Suite if your organization is at a certain level of maturity (Gartner's Level 1 - 2). This makes a lot of sense and this is the value proposition that we have proposed to organizations with the EATK.

What I did learn in the session was a status on the EA Tool vendors. If you follow my blog you may of seen my simple assessment of this space based on my experience. I talk a lot about the ability to execute, fragmentation of the EA Tooling market and so on. There were very similar themes in the status of tooling. One thing that I didn't factor in was the consolidation of tooling and the impact on existing players. I want name names, but there were some well established names in the presentation that were mentioned as declining due to the impact of consolidation in the market.

One other observation here is that when Robert talked about EA Tools he evaluated them on features. While this has worked in the past, I think we should move toward a capability type of approach when evaluating tooling. I think we will start to realize that what we traditionally thought of a EA capability is really something we already had, such as workflow, security, ECM, repo, etc.

What's Next: Context Delivery Architecture

This was an interesting one for me. When I looked at the title, I think I was expecting something much different. There were some things I liked about this topic such as the notion that this is another Architecture Style. I also, thought there were some interesting nuggets littered throughout.

However, I found there wasn't much meat to the presentation. Maybe it's too early, but I would argue that the Web 2.0 space is all over this and has a ton of great material. Microsoft as an example, is all over this. My colleagues back in Redmond such as Karthik Ravindran, Paul Stubs and Masashi Narumoto (see: Contextual Service, Contextual Service Example, Architecture for Consumer Oriented Services Cont'd) are doing some really cutting edge stuff around this very topic. I really didn't see the holistic pitch around the space mentioning who and what are the key technologies to enable this space. There was a lot of redundancy around Facebook and Nokia. For example these were not mentioned:

• Myspace - Social Networking
• Twitter - Microblogging
• Microsoft - Live Services
• Apple - iPhone and GPS location aware apps and games, music recommendations, etc.
• Zune - music recommendations, subscriptions, social music aspects, etc
• XBox 360 - Gamer Tags, Persona aware, Messenger Integration
• Zooomr - Photo geo-tagging
• Plazer - Location Services with integration into blogs and micro-blog engines
• etc.

There were also a lot of non-qualitative numbers being thrown around. There is probably more data points behind the scenes in research papers but would of really liked to see that information. Information like, where did this data come from that drove these predictions (enterprises, consumer application development, hobbyists, micro-ISVs, SMBs), probability of the prediction and the impacts on current designs and decisions.

I do think that this is going to be part of the future of IT especially as the next generation IT folks join the ranks. It is going to be expected that context services are enabled. The way in which we do things will seem somewhat antiquated to future generations and they will expect these automation services to be available.

Adapting TOGAF Globally

I both had the pleasure of attending Joel Goodling's presentation and also having conversation over dinner as well. He did a great job articulating the value of the using a general purpose EA framework such as TOGAF.

He walked through how he configured TOGAF to fit inside his corporate culture. By being mindful of that terminology and existing organizational structures will play a large role in the success of TOGAF he did some very smart things like renaming the ADM phases. He also removed some of the ADM steps (mitigated that with baking those missing bubbles into other processes).

All in all a great session.

Communicating the Value of EA

I may of become a new fan of Brian Burke. He really hits the nail on the head. There were a ton of tips in this presentation that should really be taken by all architects not just EAs. I would of actually renamed the session to something like "Communication is key to an Architects Success". Needs a little work, but you know where I am going with it...

Even though this is still a bit of 101 as well Brian highlighted some good situational leadership ideas. He reinforced the need for clear communication plans and the notion of communicating frequently even if the message is going to change.

 

Technorati Tags: Enterprise Architecture,Gartner,Context Driven Architecture,EA Tools

Gartner EA Summit - Emergence Enterprise Architecture Keynote

I wanted to give some feedback on some new thoughts from Gartner in their keynote on Emergence Architecture. Overall I thought it was a great keynote presented by Brian Burke and Nick Gall.  It was somewhat of a different theme then in previous years. The keynote centered around "Emergence Enterprise Architecture".

So we see a new term call Emergent Enterprise Architecture. Is this yet another element to put in from of EA? I certainty hope not and honestly I don't think so. So what is Emergent Systems/Enterprise Architecture?

Gartner started out with the wikipedia definition, so let's do the same. Here is the wikipedia definition of emergent:

Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning "knowledge" or "to know") is the effort to discover, and increase human understanding of how the physical world works. Through controlled methods, scientists use observable physical evidence of natural phenomena to collect data, and analyze this information to explain what and how things work. Such methods include experimentation that tries to simulate natural phenomena under controlled conditions and thought experiments. Knowledge in science is gained through research.

I really like this approach which at the end of the day which encourages innovation and R&D by true SME's in IT, Operations and the business units.

For me this really turns the EA Office into a function in which facilitates smart people to make aligned decisions.

The picture you see on the right of the hour glass is an analogy in which Gartner uses to describe this approach. The point here is that you should focus on the focal point. The focal point is the common denominator in solutions. As an example of a common denominator in lets say e-mail would be the MIME standard for defining e-mails. The common denominator does not define the consumption aspects nor the generation aspects but rather the common characteristics of an e-mail.

They also use the shipping container as a great example of this notion. They examine how a shipping container allowed the diverse and exploding business of international shipping by focusing on the common denominator, the shipping container.

I interpreted some high level principles for Emergence Architecture

1. Self adaptable architecture efforts
2. Generic personas that interact with architectures
3. Loose Coupling to external forces such as geographies and regulatory factors

The showed one of the "mega" models which was coined as the Spaghetti and Meatball diagram. I like this phrase a bit and also recommend people to refer to the quote from George Box.

"Essentially, all models are wrong, but some are useful" - George Box

I think this is very true at least right now with the current state of many tools. It seemed that in the keynote that Gartner somewhat agrees with this assessment as well where they stated that models are often never accurate.

Another possibly controversial notion proposed was when looking at the model, the boxes are not the architecture but rather the lines are the architecture. I think that is a rather bold statement and I personally think that there is some truth there but not the complete picture. I view the "lines" as a cross cutting concern across the architecture.

Below is a Open Group / IEEE 1471 based view on architecture cross cutting concerns.

In summary, this session was one of the better Gartner keynotes I have been in (and I've been in a quite a few). It was extremely grounded instead of the typical ivory tower messaging which is sometimes conveyed at these types of conferences.  This was more of a pragmatic approach, which I am a big fan. Ironically, there is almost complete alignment with the principles of the EATK (shown below) and emergence architecture. I have coined this as Enterprise Architecture 2.0.

EATK Principles

• Introduce New  and Creative Capabilities to Architecture
• Simplify and Consolidate Solutions for Architecture Design
• Leverage the Tools You Have
• Simplify the process
• Introduce Collaboration into the Architecting Process
• Surface Information in the Scope and Context of the Architect
• Every asset relates to another in some way

So if you have access to the materials from Brian Burke I would defiantly check out this new Gartner concept.

 

Technorati Tags: Enterprise Architecture,Gartner,Emergence Architecture,EA 2.0,EATK,Events,Process

Using the EATK to Capture Architecture Descriptions

The EATK makes Microsoft Word 2007 a first class citizen in the architecture description area. As I described in  my recent post called "Do Office Tools Still Play a Role in Architecture Design?" I talked in length how at least for the time being we are still using productivity tools for describing our architectures. Since this is the case more often than not, the EATK uses Word to articulate these architectures.

In this post I will give you a brief summary of how the EATK helps with documenting architecture descriptions.

There are a series of problems that the EATK is trying to solve by leveraging Microsoft Word 2007. I will not go into length in all of them but highlight some key areas.

The first is to make the creation of architecture descriptions much more intuitive and easy to do. Even though tools such as Word are easy to use we still see complexity here. That complexity comes in the form of:

• Duplicate data entry
• Template overload
• Limited ability to control quality of descriptions
• etc.

 

 

As shown above, we are adding more and more documents to an already large portfolio of documents that need to be completed. In the past this was manageable but now documents can be bloated and information has a higher probability of being duplicated. Often times this is a result of tightly coupling a document with a process step that results in a great deal of redundancy.

So how does the EATK attempt to solve these challenges? It does so by changing the context in which Word is used. Changing the context is a sometimes not an intuitive task. It takes some investigative work both on the capabilities you want to expose and potential development to the tooling.

The underlining goal is to change the role of Word from simply a word processor to more of a User Interface (UI) for designing architectures. Applying structured UI concepts to Microsoft Word provide many benefits to the architecture document.

• Structured Content – Information can be better described in the document. The reason we want to do this is because of the challenges mentioned regarding how information doesn’t integrate well with process or future design activities. One example is the process of importing a model into an architecture document. Often times we import a picture that represents a model of a specific view point of an architecture. If we had an information model we could specific that the model imported is indeed the logical model, rather than a generic image file.
• Extensible – With a little more structure information has meaning and definition. This makes that information extensible to other processes downstream.
• Consumable – Abilities to consume external content is also possible with a more structured interface. As an example, if you choose to you could import external architecture information from other systems to automate you design efforts.

 

Let's take a look at this from a technical perspective. Below illustrates how the EATK separates areas of concerns with the implimentation in Microsoft Word.

• Tool - The mechanism of Microsoft Word is referred to here. The tool provides extensibility into the user interface that provides Office Ribbons to execute tasks easily with a level of context and Office Task Panes that extend the UI with additional entry or listings of information.
• Document - The document provides the way in which a user can enter in architecture descriptions. This is different in the EATK as the document acts as the glue between the Tool and the information itself. This is accomplished through a architecture document template and the use of word custom controls.
• Information - The information in the document is managed completely different than in a traditional document. All information typed into the document is linked back to an XML node behind the scenes. This fully qualifies what is typed the information. Not only is the information rich but it is extensible.

 

Let's take a look at the implementation in the EATK. Below you can see how Ribbons, Meta-Data Properties and Task Panes are implemented. The EA Toolkit Ribbon shows at the top of the screen. These represent the functionality the functionality in this tool.

The meta-data properties provide context around the document or high-level architecture itself. There are the following fields: Title, SDLC Phase, Architecture ID, Architecture name, Project ID. This information is utilized in throughout the implementation from integration to the workflow to surfacing information in context.

Task panes shown below are able to make architecture information as transparent as possible. It allows the EATK to surface information from the architecture meta-data repository. With a double click on a pattern or asset that information is populated in the document. The document tracks if an existing pattern is used so the governance process can track reuse (among a series of other benefits).

 

The new OOXML features in Office 2007 allows us to separate the information from the document in a much cleaner way. With the new formats, the entire document is XML based. The document itself is a zip compressed file with the extension of .docx. In these files are a series of file folders.

The customXML folder is used in the EATK. Below we see that item1.xml is the system architecture XML file used for storing architecture information. All information entered into the System Architecture Document will be stored here.

 

 

Additional Screen Shots

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: Enterprise Architecture,EATK,Solution Architecture

The Lost Art of Informal Communication

James McGovern made some great points about informal communication in his post The Lost Art of Informal Communication.

I think he makes some really good points about how pushing more structure on activities or a team can sometimes be bad. When managing projects to programs we need to be mindful not to let the process control us. We should be controlling the process. 

Microsoft Patterns and Practices Application Architecture Guide

I ran across an interesting post on J.D. Meier's Blog that describes the Patterns & Practices project called the Application Architecture Guide Project 2.0.

Hosted on CodePlex.com this project aims to take guidance from Microsoft and marry it with the CodePlex community. In the projects own words:

The App Arch guide provides design-level guidance for the architecture and design of applications built on the .NET Framework. It focuses on the most common types of applications, partitioning application functionality into layers, components, and services, and walks through their key design characteristics.This guide is a collaborative effort between patterns & practices, product teams, and industry experts

It's a great idea, but like with all community projects it depends on contribution by the public. I am eager to see this one develop over time.

 

Technorati Tags: Solution Architecture,Patterns

Hug a Developer or Architect Today, They need it....

  

It's time to show a little love to our fellow Architects / Developers / Project Managers as they do have a difficult job. Show your appreciation today! And I do not mean the Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven from Entourage) way of "Hugging it Out..."

If you need a little clarification on what I am referring to check out this documentary on struggling developers in the wild.

Enjoy the start of the week dose of comedy... :)

 

What is an Architecture Style?

Recently, I have had discussions with folks at Microsoft about Architecture Styles. This term has been used in the IT industry for a very long time. I think the earliest reference was in the early 80's. But that is neither here, nor there in my opinion. We have been using this concept for a long time. As you can see from my graphic I used above, architecture styles are also used in the other architecture field as well. I think this provides us with a great way of relating what that means to our field.

So what is this term, Architecture Style? It's a bit difficult to answer this as there really isn't a full definition for this term. It's a lot like standards such as IEEE 1471. There is a very loose definition and could be subject to interpretation. From what I have observed, that is very much the case.

You can find references on:

• Wikipedia: Software Architecture
• Book: A Practical Guide to Enterprise Architecture (James McGovern, Scott W. Ambler, Mike Stevens)

So I will define what an Architecture Style means to me and hopefully it will resonate with all of you. I would love to hear your feedback as well.

An Architecture Style is a logical grouping of patterns or architecture references that is implemented through cohesive methods for solving a problem area with a unique set of concerns.

Over the years I have heard this term used in certain circles. I personally use this term for awhile to describe ways of implementing technology solutions. I find it helps articulate concepts a bit easier. The value that I see is:

• It provides framing to have a conversation about a specific topic area
  • For example, Software + Services Architecture Style will be very different than a traditional SOA Architecture Style
• Can group a series of patterns or assets in a meaningful way
• If used correctly it can definitely increase the comprehension of complex topic areas

 

I created a high level mind map that describes the concepts at a high level. This is somewhat of a mind dump and isn't the final by no stretch. It's a good starting point to have a conversation on Architecture Styles.

For concepts as abstract as Architecture Styles it is important to have samples of that it means along with a rough structure of what qualifies as a style. The mind map below attempts to do that with classifications and examples.  

As you can see in the mind map I show the structure of the Architecture Style. It is represented as hierarchal but in a real world implementation it will be less about a hierarchal structure and more about orchestration of patterns into styles.

As you can see from the example above, Service Orientation is the Master Architecture Style that contains a series of Sub Architecture Styles. This shows that styles can have sub styles. This isn't a rule by no stretch. However when there are complex styles such as Service Orientation with such broad sweeping implementations it is important to put more formalization around classifying styles and sub styles.

For Service Orientation there are a variety of styles in which to implement. I picked a few to illustrate this point. You may notice that SOA isn't shown. That is because it is a fully loaded term that mixes the principles of an architecture style with the implementation that is generally expressed in a pattern.

What I am illustrating above is the separation of architecture concerns. This helps us classify many styles and/or implementations on the principles of Service Orientation. The result provides a taxonomy to represent different architecture styles. Thus, providing a way to understand, consume and create architecture.

 

To articulate these concepts back to architecture you can touch... As an example, you could take two 19th century Tudor style homes and they could be very different form each other. The look and feel, most materials and high level layout (style) will be the same. However, the implementation of: room layouts, quality of materials, electrical, networking and central air (patterns) installation can be vastly different.

Even though they follow the same template or style there are between multiple homes if the same style they can be quite different from an implementation perspective. What we see here is that the style of the home is the same where they share some common principles for building however under the scenes there can be a vast amount of design decisions that change the home is built.

I do see that there are some challenges with using abstract concepts such as Architecture Styles. These include:

• Lack of consistent usage
• Usage of the term out of context
• Mixing the term pattern with architectural style
• Lack of industry consensus (The most important one)

 

 

Technorati Tags: Enterprise Architecture,Solution Architecture,Patterns,Architecture Styles

US Law Makers to Regulate the Cloud?

Infoworld just published a great piece called Cloud computing may draw government action. The article goes into data privacy concerns with the cloud. They state that Cloud computing will soon become an area of hot debate in Washington, D.C., with policy makers debating issues such as the privacy and security of data in the cloud, a panel of tech experts said Friday. The basis for much of this came from the Pew Internet and American Life survey which outlines consumer perception on the cloud. If you've read my blog before, information security is one of my key concerns (Seven Cloud-Computing Security Risks) I have with the cloud.

Mike Nelson asserts, "I do think government has an almost infinite ability to screw up things when they can't see the future," Nelson said. "We have to have leadership that believes in empowering users and empowering citizens."

I agree with one aspect of this statement which asserts that innovation will be hindered by enforcement of regulations on the cloud. But I think that this is trumped buy the larger concern than just innovation. With so much data going to the cloud there needs to be a greater responsibility imposed on Cloud vendors that endures protects for consumers. People often think that regulation is bad or a necessary evil. I disagree. For the most part it protects us as consumers so we can trust and have a level on insurance with cloud services.

Cloud vendors may have well intentions but they also have a conflict of interest when looking at non-tangible things such as security. Security doesn't increase the bottom line, it is something that is a bit of an unknown until something catastrophic happens. The conflict of interest solely lies in financial results in features that directly correlate vs. planning for the unforeseen. I would of thought with all the financial market issues with data breach-apolosa over the past five years that this would wake the industry up a bit.

Infoworld points out some major policy issues that still need to be worked out:

1. Who owns the data that consumers store on the network?
2. Should law enforcement agencies have easier access to personal information in the cloud than data on a personal computer?
3. Do government procurement regulations need to change to allow agencies to embrace cloud computing?

Interesting enough 49% percent of U.S. residents said they would be very concerned if law enforcement agencies has access to their cloud data. Pew Internet and American Life Project conducted a survey released Friday that goes through these details. But this is only one of the potential issues with the cloud, for example 1/5 companies use social networking sites such as myspace.com to screen for employment. It's not a stretch to image a slew of different scenarios that are less than favorable for the consumer.

The good news is that we have seen cloud vendors address privacy concerns over the past few months proactively. Google recently did and according to reports, one of the main objectives of the "new Facebook" was to improve users' privacy and security settings. Because the social network did this very well, people will remain loyal to the service over time. C.G. Lynch wrote an great post called In Facebook, Privacy is King. Check it out it is worth a read.

For me the bottom line here is that cloud vendors have the opportunity to get in front of this issue before stringent regulation occurs. This may lower the level of scrutiny that law makers impose, but the ball is in their court. I think the big cloud vendors such as Microsoft, Amazon, Google and Facebook will be the leaders in this space, hopefully this trickles down.

Check out the Infoworld article for more excerpts from the survey:

http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/09/12/Cloud_computing_may_draw_government_action_1.html

Technorati Tags: Architecture,Regulation,Privacy,Cloud